Do you want to see something amazing?

I didn’t think Colorado could get any more beautiful, but I was wrong.  Colorado is my favorite and just when I thought I had seen it all….I visited Great Sand Dunes National Park.

Last year my oldest niece needed senior pictures and I didn’t just want to do an ordinary session so we went to the Paint Mines.  Click here to check out that EPIC session.  I felt like I needed to do something equally awesome for my nephew now that he is entering his senior year.  I didn’t think I was going to be able to top the Paint Mines session but the Sand Dunes were unlike anything I have ever experienced.

Each May/June Medano creek starts flowing from the snow melt in the Sangre De Cristo mountains and it surges through the dunes.  By surging, I mean that it is almost like an ocean with waves and a tide.  It wasn’t super deep but it was fast flowing and sometimes when the surge hit hard, the water splashed up to our knees.  Because of Colorado’s wet winter and spring, the water levels were higher than usual.  But this river has the most amazing backdrop, don’t you think?

Can you believe that it is June and there is still a ton of snow on the mountains?  Yay for no drought!

Most boys complain about choosing clothes and getting their pictures taken but Noah did it all on his own.  My sister didn’t have to help at all!  And he nailed it!

Check out these ripples in the sand made from the wind blowing.

There was some weather moving in so the winds were really whipping.  By the end of the session, poor Noah’s eyes were all red!  The good news is that the weather made for cool skies.

These pictures kind of remind me of Tatooine from Star Wars.  Don’t you think?

Because of the wind and the fact that it was getting close to sunset, we practically had the dunes to ourselves.  It was fantastic!

Noah is such an even-keeled kid.  I love this young man so much.  I seriously in total denial that he is going to be 18 in a few weeks and that he only has one more year of high school!

He is such a good model!!!

I love that he was up for making this LONG trip and doing a “styled” senior session just to please his Auntie Lisa.

He admitted afterwards that he wasn’t that excited about it at first, but that it was totally worth the trip and he was so glad we came.

Seriously.  Aren’t these images so freakin’ cool?

Confession….I had to edit my kids and other nieces and nephews out of the background of this photo.  Photoshop to the rescue.

Overall, I was SO incredibly happy with the way these came out and the Great Sand Dunes should be on your bucket list if they aren’t already.

We made a whole sister/cousin trip out of this session.  Next week I will highlight the trip itself and all of the things we learned along the way in case you are wanting to make a trip to the Dunes.  So stay tuned for that.  And I am also doing a “real” senior session for Noah so that blog will come next month!

Want to see the behind the scenes of this session?  Check out this blog!